A Gathering of Blood
by TKillKats
Summary: Weird stuff is happening in Lyra's world, who is now 18. She wakes up one day to discover that everyone in her town has been asassinated, And Asriel has declared himself 'God'. pg-13 for intense gore, violence and swearing. Plz r/r!
1. Default Chapter

This is my first hdm story! Lyra is really different a bit more merciless =D I kind of let my dark humor take over.

This is really gory, hence the name.  Plz r/r!

Oh ya, Asriel is alive.  

Disclaimer: I don't own his dark materials so don't sue me! 

A Gathering of Blood 

At 7:00 A.M., May 12, six years after the departure of the legends Will Parry and Lyra Belacqua (Silvertongue), the second epic of The Two begins.  Lyra was walking to her school on a brisk, cool morning, simply overflowing with peacefulness, when it happened.  Three men stepped out of a shadow to her left, two with a knife, and the other with a ferocious looking leopard daemon, who was baring her teeth viciously.  Trouble had been abroad for quite some time, and she had been foolish to travel in the early morning when no one else was there, even if it had been a wonderful morning.  By the chance that they might not want to rob her, she kept on walking, but the three men took a step towards her, and she broke into a run. 

The three men started after her, the two with knives trying to run and aim at the same time.  Before the leopard daemon could get to her and Pan, they had made a sharp turn to their left, surprising even the leopard.  She got as far as she could from the previous road, then traveled on a bit further, and after that turning back onto the same road she had been traveling on before.  Her three chasers would not think to check back on the same road she had just been walking.  She was right.  She ran the rest of the way.  When she arrived at her school, she stopped in dismay and panic.  Three students whom she recognized were lying in a grotesque manner on the front stairs to the entrance hall, all of them with their throats nicked, small puddles of blood accompanying each corpse.  

"What the hell is going on?"  She asked herself, venturing nervously towards the door.  What she found inside was many times worse than what lay on the stairs.  Carcasses were at a plenty, littering the ground, almost making her vomit.  She could see the leftover dust of departed daemons, something that disturbed Pan a lot.  She did not stay inside long.  She did not bother to check that all her friends had been slaughtered by an unknown enemy.  Racing through the alleys, she came to her house.  The three assassins were nowhere to be seen.  Three people could not have mustered such destruction.  Stopping only inside for her knives and her silenced luger, her favorite gun, she ventured outside, and two knives flashed past her face.  _Shit._

Spinning around, she took a knife out of her belt and rapidly hurled the deadly weapon at a man on the left of her door, who was charging at her.  He instantly fell to her deadly aim, and gurgling blood, the man watched his own owl daemon disintegrate into dust.  In the next millisecond she had taken her luger into her left hand and shot the other man.  A bloody wound appeared just above his nose, and his daemon too disintegrated.  She was lucky that the man with the leopard daemon was not here, or she would have been killed.  

"Is it over?" Came a trembling voice from inside Lyra's house.  Pan was terrified of violence in general, after making some close, bloody escapes himself.

"Yes, Pan, they're dead," She said, glancing disgustedly at the lifeless bodies.

"Get all of my rounds, too."  Soon coming out with the rounds, Pantalaimon clambered onto her back.

"What's going on, Lyra?"

"Only way to find out is that other man.  We gotta find him."  Lyra hadn't cried since Will had left.  It was doubtful that she ever would.  She never seemed to show true emotion either.  It was hard to feel powerfully after something like Will happened.

                Lyra soon saw him, prowling around the alleys, and she quickly ducked her head, pulling out a knife at the same time.  The man was walking her way.  After passing Lyra, who was hiding behind a trashcan in an intersecting alley, she slinked over to him, put him in a headlock, and pricked his back with her knife.  His leopard daemon instantly turned around, growling and baring her teeth.

"Your daemon moves, you can kiss yourself goodbye."  The man whimpered and groaned in pain.  The daemon had heard what she had said, and had sat down obediently.  

"Good. Now tell me, what the hell is going on?" She pricked her knife savagely onto his back, drawing blood. _Only way to get'em talkin'._

The man was clearly afraid of her.

"L-lord Asriel, h-he declared hims-self God.  He *_gulp*_ hired me!"  Lyra was full of hatred for her 'Uncle'.  She almost wasn't surprised that her ambitious, power-needing father declared himself God.  _Almost._  

"What was did he tell you to do? And don't stutter!"

"He told me and 506 others to kill everyone in this town!  Please don't kill me! he threatened me! I had no choice but to follow his orders or be killed!"

_How can he expect to rule the worlds by tyrant force? _

"Where is he now? And what happened to the others?"

"35 were killed, and me'n two others were left behind for any survivors.  We were all told to meet Asriel at the church next to Oxford!"  Lyra knew where that was.  But suddenly the man drew away from her headlock, backed up, and pulled a knife out of his belt.

          "We're even now, lady!  Say buh-bye!"  __

_He thinks he's so clever.  What a bastard. _ Lyra pulled out her luger and shot the man before he could do anything.  She didn't believe his 'threaten' story.  He was more likely a mercenary.  Wiping off her knife, she sheathed it, and walked back to her house.  She suddenly let out a shrill whistle, and a horse came galloping towards her.  She always kept a week's worth of food in her belt.

"C'mon, Soph, we've got a long way to go.  And she climbed onto the sturdy paint's back saddlelessly, Let Pan crawl onto her shoulder, and started off into the afternoon.

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Like it?  Lyra is kinda different :D A Paint is a kind of horse.  Plz review!

TK


	2. Satanic Wishes

Hi ppls! I got no idea what to write after this, so if you have an idea, tell me!

This one's more talk than fight, and takes on a lighter air, but I'll include a little gore ;)

Sorry if some parts seem sappy =P

**Satanic Wishes**

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            Arriving three kilometers away from the church at dusk, Lyra stopped for a brief rest and food.  She had clumsily forgotten hay or water for Sketch, her mare, but shared her water with the starched horse.  After slaking her own thirst, and ate a roll, she hopped onto the mare's back once again and rode the remaining three miles.  She did not even bother for secrecy, firing away at any marauder she came upon.  None of them carried guns, so it was relatively easy for her.  But ignoring any chance of concealment or surprise was her mistake.

          When she arrived at the church, she was a poor sight.  Soot and grime slimed over her hair, her shirt and jeans torn and literally caked with dust.  But what was definitely worse was what she saw.  

_Shit._

Asriel had walked out of the arched doorway, equipped with two guards on either side of him, all carrying rifles aimed at her heart.  She was at Asriel's mercy.  But before she could act, he spoke.

          "My men will not kill you, Lyra.  They are merely a defense in case you… act out of turn.  I wish to talk.  Come in."

"Damn it, Asriel, what the hell do you want?"  She yelled, but she jumped off of her mare's back and strode in, flipping off the guards at the doorway, who were red with fury.  She sniggered.  It was something she would be content with if it were the last thing she did before she was killed.

          Asriel indicated a chair next to his, and she sat.

"So, _Dad,_ What the hell are you doing?  You wanna be God?  Tough shit, man, that ain't gonna be easy."  Asriel grimaced at his title, and the term usage.  He had quite a vulgar daughter.  

          "I do not exactly want to be God, but something similar… Well, you see, in that earlier adventure of ours, there was something very important that was missing.  I personally think that being God held too much responsibility.  So I decided that I would settle for something a bit easier.  I am going to become, er… Diablo." 

 Expecting a surprised and disbelieving reaction, he himself was surprised to see that she was unfazed, sarcasm the only trait in her voice.

"So you and your mighty army of five hundred mercenaries are going to resort to tyranny, fending off the millions and billions and trillions and quadrillions of people that revolt.  A very logical plan."  She could not help but grin.

"Well," Asriel began, not discouraged at the least, "many people, and _angels,_ know about me.  Angels know everything, and there is a rumor in every street of every world that the God killer, Asriel, has returned.  Why they do not know.  Now, I have a prosperous offer for you.  Does a God"-"Devil!" Lyra broke in angrily, but he continued, "Not need mighty generals to lead his battles?"

Lyra could not believe her ears._ This bastard wants me to massacre worlds for him?_

"You know I'm gonna say no! Sure I kill some people, so you think I'm going to troop around the worlds knifing millions of innocent souls that revolt against a fucking Diablo like you!  Lock me up or kill me right now!"  Asriel was furious, and ordered her condemned to a jail cell in a nearby prison until she had rethought her decision carefully.

          Sketch was brought in with her.  Her cell was not damp, more of a dry, gritty texture.  They took away her knives, but they did not know about her silenced luger, as they hadn't examined the bodies of the dead.  She had hidden it in her pants, where they didn't dare search, so she still had it.  Now her guards had just to fall asleep and she was out of there…

          She abruptly jerked up from her pretended slumber, and checked on the guards, three of them.  Two were asleep, and the other was on the verge of sleep, looking blankly at the wall next to her cell.

_Thump.  One down-Thump. Two, and-Yep, that's all of'em. _

She had plenty of luger ammo, and carefully shot away at the bars until there was a passage large enough for her slender frame._ Oh damn. _She had forgotten Sketch.  The mare nickered softly, wagging her tail like a hopeful dog.  Her beautiful sketch-like colors gave way to her unique beauty, and Lyra sighed in exasperation.

"God, Sketch, how come you have to be essential and beautiful?"

          Half an hour later, Sketch was out of the cell.  There was one idea she had.  All of her life after Will had left, she had kept a single shard of the knife that had changed the two's life forever.  A single dust-gathering tear rolled down her cheek.  The shard had been of the side that cut through worlds, the important side.  Taking it out of her belt (Asriel had not thought it dangerous), she tried to feel for the niche that Will always felt.  She felt herself sink into oblivious bliss, not realizing her movements.  All of a sudden, she came back to reality and saw that she could feel something that wasn't there in the air, and cut at it.  And lo and behold, there was Will's world.

  Enlarging the cut in space, she stepped through it, Sketch following after.  The air was cooler here, she noticed and had an uneasy air about it.  And then it hit her.  She was inside a prison in Will's world!  Luckily, she was not in a cell, but a guard might take her for an escaping criminal and shoot.  She caught sight of a guard, and she slunk into the shadow.  Her spying skill and secrecy matched even that of a Gallivespian.  When he walked out of sight, she slinked over to the intersecting hallways, snuck behind the careless guard, and with a deft motion, he fell unconscious.  She was surprised to see that he owned knives, of good quality, and took them gladly.  She then ran out.  _How am I supposed to find Will?_

These days, people were extra careful, and even for money, she doubted anyone would take her in for the night.  Galloping far away from the prison, she came across a small town.  It was almost light, and she was tired.  And then she remembered Mary.  Mary Malone would take her in, even with Lyra's new ways, clothes and age.  She was unmistakably Lyra.  Even after all these years, Lyra remembered where she lived vividly, and started down to the town.  First she had to know where she was in Will's world, and then she could find Mary Malone.

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Sorry, I promise lots more gore in the next chappy! 


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